The deathless appeal of R-Patz

Every teen idol has a calling card - a look, a sound, a phrase
so potent that merely the anticipation of it will transport his
legion of admirers into that most moist territory located somewhere
between incipient madness and uncontrollable lust. Elvis Presley
sent his quiff west while his hips pointed east; Brando had his
biker's cap at just such a tilt; while the Beatles boasted the
opening Fadd9 chord of "A Hard Day's Night". Robert Pattinson - and if you don't think he belongs in the
above company, then you clearly didn't get out much in 2009 - well,
Robert Pattinson looks like death warmed up.

Pattinson, for the uninitiated, entered this pantheon of poster
boys with his pasty-faced depiction of the vampire, Edward Cullen,
in Twilight. Thanks largely to RP's dark-eyed charm,
Twilight's Catherine Hardwicke became the most
commercially successful female director ever. Meanwhile, author
Stephenie Meyer, from whose book the film was adapted, bestrides
the bestseller lists, a storming Mormon and latter-day JK. The
third instalment of the series, Eclipse, hits cinemas in
July.

As Cullen, Pattinson is the latest incarnation of the doomy,
Gothic leading man who's been getting ladies in a lather since the
Brontës first sharpened a quill. What's new here, however, is that
the Pattinson phenomenon has been propelled by an unstoppable
trinity of Twitter, Facebook and Bebo. Combining an ancient
archetype with a modern medium, Pattinson has become a conduit for
the traditional sublimated rage, lust, frustration and fantasy of a
billion bedroom-bound teenage girls (aka the Twihards). He is the
first genuine www.heart-throb.

Nevertheless, he has also inspired many traditional dead-tree,
deadhead, cut-and-paste quickie biographies that tell of a
comfortable upbringing in Barnes to a model-agency mother and
vintage car-importing father, two sisters (one, Lizzy, a recorded
singer-songwriter) and that he answers to the nickname, Patty...
which is also the name of his dog.

Fame came in two simple, but giant, strides the first seeing him
cast as the doomed Cedric Diggory (or is it Dedric Ciggory as all
Harry Potter names are equally intelligible when
Spoonerised?) in Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire, and
from there via not very much to the lead role in
Twilight.

Pattinson's appeal - not unlike Brando's - is linked directly to
the character he portrays, as much as his own persona. Edward
Cullen is an outsider, albeit a cultured one, who has time for none
save his fellow family members and his beloved, Bella. With his
refusenik rectitude and James Dean-like snarl (not to mention
fabulous facial structure), he stands foursquare in opposition to
the clean-cut models of complicity represented by High School
Musical and the Jonas Brothers (the latter a multiheaded
construction more monstrous than anything even Mary Shelley could
have imagined).

As well as the requisite bloodsucking chops, Cullen can read
minds and is immortal, though, it must be said, he looks
permanently peaky. Indeed, he manages to look so frail and pallid
that the very effort of balancing his vertiginous quiff atop his
finely chiselled features seems to be sapping every ounce of his
energy, diminishing the demonstrably low levels of haemoglobin to a
life-threatening level. In short, the very effort of staying alive
appears to be killing him. What hormonally rampant, teenage girl
could ask for more?

But the ace in the hole for Cullen is that he will not
consummate the relationship. (This is one - possibly charitable -
explanation why Pattinson has found favour with the mothers of so
many adolescent girls.) The fortunate nexus of Stephenie Myers'
Mormon beliefs and the commercial clout of a PG-12 character who
can commit but can't copulate has taken his appeal into the
stratosphere. Twilight's True Love Never Dies ethos ickily
echoes the True Love Waits pro-virginity Bible Belt pressure group.
For his legions of admirers, the attraction appears to be getting
teased to the point of climax and left hanging. To be left
perpetually fluttering on the precipice of ecstasy somewhere close
to what the 16th-century poet, Pierre de Ronsard would characterise
as, "Chaud, froid, comme la fièvre amoureuse me traite", and what
the turn-of-the century realist Roger Mellie would call "the
vinegar strokes".

It has also been Pattinson's good fortune to find himself at the
forefront of the latest reanimation of interest in the vampire
myth. True Blood is Twilight's R-rated older
sibling, made by HBO, created by Six Feet Under's Alan Ball and
based on Charlaine Harris' The Southern Vampire Mysteries
series of novels. Set in a Louisiana world where vampires and
humans co-exist, Sookie Stackhouse (played by Anna Paquin) is a
telepathic waitress and sex is always on the menu, while today's
specials include violence, death and painfully engorged male
members.

Pattinson's people won't let him get anywhere near that kind of
thing any time soon, you would imagine. But it will be
interesting to see how Robert Pattinson one day will leave
Twilight behind and seek further fortune in a Goth-less
world.

I have to admit that I became a R. Pattinson's fan after seeing "Twilight", then I saw "The haunted airman" and "Remember me" and after that I'm sure he's gonna be the most shinnig movie star of our time cause he's a great actor.

alina

28 Jun 2010

Its funny but you would think as a reporter you would investigate your subject. If you would have, you would know that Mr. Pattinson's appeal goes way beyond teenage girls. That he has had other projects that he is and has worked on where he has proven to be a very good actor. That most people that enjoy the "Twilight" books are rarely attracted to the 'mormon' aspect of waiting till marriage or the supernatural elements of vampire and werewolf and are more attracted to the fact that this is a story about a man that loves a woman and would do anything to protect her. Yes, it helps that he's extremely handsome but he is much more than just looks.

Lissette Espaillat

28 Jun 2010

Research Bel Ami and Little Ashes.

indranee

29 Jun 2010

"Pattinson's people won't let him get anywhere near that kind of thing any time soon, you would imagine. But it will be interesting to see how Robert Pattinson one day will leave Twilight behind and seek further fortune in a Goth-less world."
1. "Little Ashes" (2008)
2. "Bel Ami" (2011)
I always thought researching the object you write about was part of the journalist's job. Silly me.

bells

29 Jun 2010

Mr. Pattinson will be fine. I can see him escaping the Vampire Role in the near Future because he has Talent and Ability to slip into different Characters. His Face is just a Treat to look at...without getting boring. I think a lot of people want him around for a long time because he is different